made clear that he would keep his commitment to end the war in iraq. and he made clear that the war in afghanistan would grow. at the end of his first year in office, president obama announced a surge of tens of thousands of troops into afghanistan, putting more american there than george w. bush ever did. the president insisted that the surge into afghanistan would not last forever. he said the surge in troop numbers had previously over by roughly now, the end of september, 2012. now a little ahead of schedule, before the end of the month, the pentagon has announced that the surge into afghanistan is over. there had been as many as 100,000 americans on the ground in afghanistan. now it is down to 68,000 which, frankly, is still a huge number. especially when you consider how little political attention those 68,000 americans get. our ongoing war in afghanistan is not much of an issue in this all-consuming presidential race. mostly because i think one of the two sides just doesn't want to talk about it at all. the war, mr. romney said, did not come up i